I'm Gonna Be Hokage!
by MatrixExplosion
Summary: When Naruto smiled and proclaimed, 'I'm gonna be Hokage', people listened.


**Title:** I'm Gonna Be Hokage

**Author:** Matrix_Explosion

**Pairing:** Naruto x ???

**Word Count:** 2,614

**Rating:** T (For Swearing and Gore)

**Date Submitted:** March 18, 2010

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Naruto; Kishimoto does.

**Legend**

**Jutsu Name**  
"Human Talking"  
_'Human Thinking'  
_**"Demon Or Summon Talking/Kyuubified Naruto Speaking"  
**_**'Demon Or Summon Thinking/Inner Sakura Talking'**_

**Summary(s):** Meet Uzumaki Naruto:Son of a Hokage. Godson of a Sannin. Raised by the student of another Sannin. Taught by the student of a Hokage. When he smiled and said, 'I'm gonna be Hokage!' people listened.

**XX AN XX**

New story, will last a few chapters that progress really fast. Really just the main points of the series, something I'm doing just for the hell of it.

The main idea's actually taken from Nugar on the Fanfiction Forum, _with permission_. He decided that he wasn't going to continue it, but I liked the idea way too much to just let it fade.

So yeah, credit for the idea completely goes to him, hell, even this chapter was mostly written by him. I just touched it up and whatnot. In any case

Chapter 01…

**XX AN XX**

**Chapter 01**

A hand reached out, pale and withered, caressing the remnants of a once prideful village, then falling limply to his side as the aged concrete crumbled like so much ash underneath his gentle grip.

Five long, cylindrical tubes thrust into the night sky around him, setting the ground awash in a blue-black hue. Obsidian chakra ran down the sides of each pillar, hissing as it touched the already scorched ground.

Slowly, almost reverently, he stepped into the middle of the array, careful not to smudge the intricate runes spread around him. Raising a hand to his chest, he ripped off the dirtied bandages, and then stepped out of his grey robe and sandals in one quick motion.

Runes, seals, and glyphs coated his body from head to toe, melding seamlessly with the seal on the ground in two, winding spirals from each ankle.

It was time.

Frowning, he brought his hands together, eyes closed, and around him the five pillars of chakra lit up from within. It wouldn't be long now before _it _came back, so he had to hurry.

Nevertheless, he slowly ran through the seals, careful not to make a mistake and ruin what had been decades in the making. And with each hand seal that passed, the seal around him lit up brighter and brighter, the black chakra slowly but surely funnelling itself into the massive array.

He almost recoils from the light, great rends of flesh peeling from his legs and feet, the closest to the chakra slowly pooling around him, but he pushes past the nauseating pain, past the blinding agony lancing up his spine as the chakra slowly courses through his veins when-

There's a sound like the end of the world in the distance, and he slams together his palms, the symbols around him blaring to life.

And a man who hadn't felt joy since he had first found the solution couldn't fight his first genuine smile in over a decade.

Slowly, gradually, the grin widened, revealing a serpentine tongue as he threw his head back and laughed. Even as his body began to dissolve and his mind fell apart bit by agonizing bit, Orochimaru laughed until all that was left in the clearing was a seal array surrounded by the remnants of the Hokage Tower.

However, if one listened carefully, they could still hear him laughing.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

Uzumaki Naruto was the name at the top of the paper, an essay on chakra theory as related to elemental jutsu.

Mizuki didn't even bother looking at the rest of it. He simply scribbled a perfect score near the top and threw it into a stack with the rest of the graded papers. What difference would it make if he looked at it? There was no doubt in his mind that every answer would be correct, insightful, and written in the same king of beautiful kanji usually found on wall scrolls. And this brat, an eleven year old Academy student turned them in, in less time than it took most people to scratch their names out.

"Aren't you going to even read it?" Iruka piped up from behind him. Mizuki turned towards his fellow teacher and couldn't stop the small flare of irritation that flashed across his features.

"And what, waste my time? You know as well as I do that… kids paper won't be anything less than perfect." He had to catch himself before he used another, less polite term, "You can't honestly tell me you don't think there's something wrong with him."

"He's a genius. You know they're usually a bit strange compared to other people," Iruka replied, waving off Mizuki's concerns. "And you know his family. He's the son of the apprentice of one Sannin, and raised by the apprentice of another." It was an old topic for them, which Mizuki brought up at least once a month. "He's what you'd hope to see out of the son of a Hokage."

"Genius?" Mizuki replied incredulously, "No, he's not a genius. That Uchiha boy, now he's a genius. But even he makes mistakes now and then." He grabbed Naruto's essay up and angrily waved it at Iruka.

Each line of every kanji was a perfectly executed brush stroke, and the well formed characters seemed to hang on the page just so. Everything, from the words he used to describe chakra to the calligraphy to the overall composition, told of refined harmony.

"I could take this paper, that the damned kid turned in for a homework assignment to any shop in the market district and get five hundred ryo for it." Mizuki paused. "That's not genius. I don't know what that is."

Iruka shrugged carelessly, "So he's a legend in the making." A part of Iruka couldn't help but almost shake in excitement at the fact that he was teaching someone like Naruto, "Shouldn't you be happy that you're teaching him?"

Defeated, the grey-haired chuunin slumped into his seat, shaking his head, "Maybe, if I wasn't so worried that all that smiling was hiding something evil."

A blast of killing intent shook through his spine, and Mizuki gulped, realizing his mistake, _'Shit!'_

"You might want to watch talk like that." Iruka stood up and gathered his papers before making his way to the door, "You know the story as well as I do. We teach it to the kids every year. The Kyuubi was defeated by the two heroes of Konoha, one to seal it away, and one to make sure it could never escape. Keep talking like that and you're going to end up on Anko or Jiraiya-sama's shitlist.

Sensing the anger in Iruka's voice, Mizuki finally shut his mouth.

It was long after Iruka had left that Mizuki finally let himself relax. He had forgotten about the chuunin's attachment to the blonde demon brat, he was just lucky Iruka was so forgiving. The last person to mention ill of Naruto had ended up in the hospital courtesy of an angry elite jounin.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

"Welcome home, Naruto-kun," Anko said cheerfully, looking up from the couch where she was reading a faded scroll, "Out training with the others?"

"We were, but their mothers wanted them home in time for supper," Naruto replied, his voice rich and smooth. Removing his shoes, the blonde jinchuuriki hung up his long, pale orange jacket, deliberately designed to remind people of the Fourth's without being a direct copy. "I suppose the mission went well?" He hadn't been expecting her to be home for another two days.

The house the two of them shared was large and multi storied, with its own dojo, library, and several bedrooms. Anything and everything a shinobi could need was stored in the large, hollowed-out root cellar, and the backyard spanned an acre's worth of fertile forestry perfect for training.

She nodded in response to his question.

They lapsed into a comfortable silence which lasted all the way up through supper. Naruto had always been such a happy child, full of smiles, but most people remarked on how quiet and restrained he was. Even his laughter, and he laughed a lot, was quiet.

He was a curious child though, always asking questions, and often asking very clever, insightful questions. In training, too, Naruto was a child that took things very seriously, often running in the bright sunlight or practicing taijutsu on the roof of his house, boldly announcing to anyone who looked that he was an up and comer.

"I finished that seal array you showed me."

"Really, now. Shall I check your work before you apply it?"

"Please, sensei."

Together, they retreated to a surprisingly complex, incredibly well guarded basement workroom. Naruto took pains to live up to the sunny disposition his blond hair and tan would indicate, but there were some secrets best kept in the dark.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

From birth, Naruto had been a very social person. If asked, he would claim to have lots of friends, and there wasn't a student in the academy who didn't claim his friendship. Still, it was clear he had his favourites, mostly sons and daughters of prominent clans, and chief among them was the last remaining Uchiha in Konoha, Sasuke.

No one thought it odd that the two most popular boys, both geniuses, would become friends. Both came from rough circumstances, though everyone agreed the Uchiha had it worse, given that his whole family had been slaughtered by his brother.

Still, Naruto had been a village pariah for a while, at least until word of his heritage had been leaked. And it was so tragic and noble the way two of the greatest heroes Konoha had ever known had both given their lives for him.

It was a little more of a surprise how Naruto had picked a third to be close with. A girl with no special background, one Haruno Sakura. But when they saw how her mind was sharp and her chakra control perfect, it just made them more impressed with Naruto. His eye for potential was better than anyone else's, because he was there on the same level as his friends.

And, when they all graduated from the academy and were assigned to teams, it was only logical that Naruto and his handpicked best were put on the same team.

Anko was too busy to take on a team, but there was an obvious substitute, if you knew him. Kakashi had long held guilt over his teammate Obito, and he was the only skilled Sharingan user the village had, so of course he had to teach young Sasuke.

But it was even more important, at least to him, that he teach Naruto. After all, he was the one that found the boy in the aftermath of that climatic battle against the Kyuubi, lying in the middle of the remains of a complex seal array. The Yondaime, Kakashi's own sensei, lay dead on one side, his life spent to seal the Kyuubi into Naruto.

And on the other side lay the dead body of Orochimaru, Minato's advisor and friend, the only Sannin who'd been in Konoha at the time of the attack. Jiraiya, sadly, had been too far away to return in time to help his student and his teammate fight.

Ironically, he had been looking for some information that Orochimaru himself had requested, 

And so, Team Seven was formed with high expectations.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

Kakashi quickly took his team off the regular D-rank and started letting them do fast, local C-rank missions.

And that's where the next day found them; standing in the Mission's Room and waiting further instruction.

In front of him, the Sandaime huffed on his pipe, acrid smoke wafting into the air from within the cherry glow, "Here it is, an escort mission to Wave." Taking out the request form, he handed it to his secretary, "Quite a bit longer than your usual C-rank, but I believe your team can handle it."

Pressing a button on the desk, he called for his receptionist, "Please send Tazuna-san in Izumi."

Seeing as he had nothing better to do, he was about to slip out his book when Naruto's voice broke through his thoughts, "Kakashi-sensei..." The scarecrow 'hummed', turning towards his prized student, "I would like to lead this mission."

"Maa, Naruto, you sure you're up to it?" It wasn't the first time his three genin had requested to take on a mission without his guidance. On occasion, he had even allowed it for some of the shorter C-rank missions.

Sasuke in particular seemed impatient to be out from under his thumb, to be trusted to do missions on their own. The last scion of the Uchiha clan had a burning desire to prove himself, of which Kakashi was well aware, but when even Naruto started pushing to lead a mission, Kakashi had eventually given in.

And it wasn't as if there was any doubt in their abilities. The level of teamwork the three displayed was unheard of since the days of the Sannin. Naruto was the unquestioned leader, at least within the three, though he always listened to him and obeyed his orders without question.

So, albeit reluctantly, he nodded in consent, "Alright, I guess you three can-"

The door to their left opened soundlessly, and Naruto wrinkled his nose in disgust as the smell of old, cheap booze hit him like a veritable wall, "What's this!?' An old, drunken man leaned in closer, inspecting the three genin with hazy eyes, "I paid for a team of shinobi, not some wet behind the ear kids."

Calm as ever, Naruto stepped in front of his team, blue eyes tranquil, "I assure you Tazuna-san, my teammates and I are more than enough to handle the odd bandit that may come after you." He almost smirked when the bridge builder's eyes widened, quietly muttering, "Or are you expecting something more"

Tazuna shrunk back as if struck, face going an ashen pale before he composed himself and straightened, huffing in indignation, "I guess you three will do."

And then he was out the door.

A small silence stretched between the jounin and his students before Kakashi sighed, shifting, "Alright then, you three will need to meet him at the Eastern Gate tomorrow, 8 am sharp." He raised his hand into seal, eye crinkling, "Don't be late!"

The last thing he saw was the three bemused grins of the genin before existence blinked out like a light and he found himself in his apartment.

He had nothing to worry about. It wasn't as if they hadn't done this before.

Besides, Naruto had already signed Anko's snake summoning contract. If they _did _end up with trouble, he would be one of the first to know.

But despite the knowledge that all was well, Kakashi couldn't help but stop the feelings of dread shivering through him.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

The ground shook beneath Naruto's feet as the Eastern Gate clanged shut behind him. The forest of Konoha stretched out in front of him, a sea of green and brown and yellow, and he coulnd't help the small, vicious grin that spread across his whiskered cheeks.

It was time.

**XXXXXXXXXX**

Son of a Hokage. Godson of a Sannin. Raised by the student of another Sannin. Taught by the student of a Hokage.

When Naruto smiled and proclaimed, 'I'm going to be the Hokage!' people listened.

**XX AN XX**

And there you have it.

So, anyone figure it out yet? If you did, well, leave me a review and tell me what you think.

Remember, read and review.


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